Managing Screens During Performances

Musicians know the importance of being able to see each other to perform well. In this unit, we will consider some basic approaches to organising cameras to make sure that visual communication is maintained in an online space.

Eye contact and general body language are recognised as important factors when working with other musicians and also when communicating to your audience. Recording studios typically spend lots of money in facilities that enable musicians to see as well as hear each other (whether this be camera systems or expensive specialist windows or booths).

Thinking about online collaborations, camera angles are important for the same reason. Your fellow performers will no doubt want to see you in order to facilitate your performance together in the online environment.

Artistic approaches can be taken to camera angles but we would encourage you to start with some simple solutions. Choose an angle that gives an overall view of the performer including important parts related to the playing of their instrument, e.g. the guitar’s fretboard or the piano’s keyboard. If you are playing as part of a group, try to organise your fellow musicians so no one has their back to the camera.

In terms of presenting yourselves online, software environments such as Zoom allow you to organise the images of all the cameras in your session. If the performers each have access to multiple cameras, different angles can be set up for each camera. Zoom offers ‘in call hot keys‘ (i.e. keyboard shortcuts) for switching between cameras live.

Scores and chord charts can be usefully shared with your fellow musicians. Zoom has a screen share facility that allows you to share both your screens (score/chart), whilst still displaying your camera.

Jamkazam also allows musicians to switch between two cameras live using ‘shortcuts’ and also can show two cameras at the same time (see the ‘Webcam’ menu in Jamkazam). Screen sharing of scores is also possible in a similar way to Zoom’s capabilities. Effective screen sharing scores and charts can be a little challenging if you only have limited screen computer/device space. Make sure you have enough ‘real estate’ on your computer monitor!